Instagram Heat Maps Show Where News Is Breaking In Real-Time [Pics]

Social media has already proven its worth as a way to find breaking news stories, but thanks to a new tool called HereFeed, it could also provide a way to find out where the latest news is happening. HereFeed is a real-time visual map that groups Instagram photos as big pink bubbles based on where they were geotagged. This kind of tool could prove useful as a way to decide where to send field reporters, as well as a way to source visual assets for a particular story.

The tool was created by Ryan Sit, co-founder of Science Inc and former VP of Social Products at MySpace, during his spare time over the past few months. In an interview with FastCompany he shared his thoughts on the benefit of the service:

It allows you to see your surroundings in a whole new depth. Not only real-time what is popular, but the people there. This richness hasn’t been done before.

Apart from news stories and local events you may otherwise have missed, the maps could be a way to get more personal insight into local restaurants and bars. If you can see the kind of fun people might or might not be having, then you can make a more informed choice about where to go. “The bubbles are sized by popularity, so sometimes older stuff is bigger because it was more popular. The new ones are shown in the stream below and the dot is there, but more popular ones are highlighted,” explains Sit.